A Bad Day for Hair
by Laura Louisa Lewis
Summary: Danny glanced over his brother, taking in the new haircut. "So, what happened?" he asked. Jamie sighed. "It came over the radio as a simple business dispute," he began. Two explanations for why Jamie Reagan was sporting that buzz-cut haircut at the beginning of Season 7.
1. Version 1: Dyeing to Know

_Author's Note: So, there's probably a perfectly normal reason why Will Estes cut his hair super short over the summer. But that's reality, and reality can be boring that way. Fortunately, this is fanfiction, and in fanfiction, there are multiple, more-interesting explanations for why Jamie Reagan was sporting a buzz cut at the beginning of Season 7. Here are two of them._

==BB==BB==

 **Version 1: Dyeing to Know**

Danny Reagan banged on his brother's apartment door for the second time. "Kid, I know you're in there. Open up," he called through the door. "I saw your car downstairs." He was reaching for the key he kept in case of emergency when he finally heard the door being unlocked.

"Don't say anything, okay Dan?" Jamie said immediately.

"About what?" Danny looked his brother over and quickly noticed the new haircut. "Drop and give me fifty, grunt," he teased.

"Come on, Danny."

Danny smirked. "What happened?"

"Like you didn't hear. You just stopped by my place tonight for no reason?"

"I heard an officer from the 12th had a minor incident today. Didn't get all the details." But the few details he'd heard were the real reason he'd stopped by tonight, not that he'd tell Jamie that. "I stopped by because I need a place to crash for a few hours. We identified a suspect in that double murder, and he lives just down the street. He typically gets home at four in the morning. Didn't want to disturb Lin and the boys by going home for a few hours. But, anyway, what happened to you?"

Jamie sighed. "It came over the radio as a minor business dispute…"

==BB==BB==

"So, partner, summer or winter?" Eddie Janko asked her partner.

"What about them?" Jamie asked.

"Which do you like better? Hot, sunny summer or cold, snowy winter?"

"Summer," Jamie answered quickly. "It's nice and warm, and you can spend time outside until it gets dark, which happens a lot later in the day."

"But what about the snow? It makes the trees so pretty. Oh, and the Christmas lights!"

"Yeah, if you're in a park. Otherwise, it makes the sidewalks slushy and the roads icy."

"Pessimist," Eddie grumbled. "What about for the job? Summer tends to bring out the crazy in people. They spend more time outside interacting with each other and making trouble for us. In winter, they stay inside and away from each other."

"Now who's being a pessimist?"

"12-David, business dispute at the beauty salon," the dispatcher rattled of the address.

"See, just like this. It's summer, and people are freaking out at a beauty salon. One of the most relaxing places you can go," Eddie argued even as Jamie increased his speed. This didn't sound like a call that required the lights and siren.

A few minutes later, he brought the car to a stop in front of the salon, and the two officers made their way into the business.

"Back there," the receptionist gestured toward a station halfway down the room. "Nina's customer, Barbara, is going nuts."

Jamie glanced in the direction the receptionist was pointing. Two women were facing each other across a salon chair, both screaming at each other. "Nina! Barbara! What's the problem here?" he called to the women as he and Eddie walked toward them.

Barbara turned to the officers, then back to Nina. "You called the cops, you incompetent bitch?" she yelled at Nina and started moving around the chair.

Nina moved another step also. "I didn't call. Not that you don't deserve it, slapping me like that. Crazy whore!"

"Hey! Ladies!" Jamie yelled at the two as he and Eddie ran to separate them. "What's this about?"

"She thinks she can tell me how to do my job," Nina huffed.

"I can, you dumbass. I wanted fuchsia highlights. But look at this color. Look!" Barbara pointed toward a bowl of hair color on a stand beside the chair. "That's hot bubblegum pink, not fuchsia."

Jamie looked at the bowl. Fuchsia was a shade of pink, if he remembered right, and that goo was definitely pink. "Nina, is this the color Barbara wanted?"

"It would have come out fuchsia if she'd let me finish," Nina insisted. "I'm the color specialist here. Not that beauty school dropout. Thinks she knows everything because she finished one quarter." Nina directed her last comment at her irate client.

That was apparently the last straw for Barbara. "You incompetent tramp!" she screamed. Before Eddie could stop her, she grabbed the bowl of dye and flung it at Nina.

Unfortunately, Barbara's aim was off, and instead of hitting Nina, the bowl hit Jamie square on the top of his head. "Hey!" he yelped. Fortunately, the bowl was some sort of thin plastic, so it hadn't really hurt, but he could feel the cold goo running down the side of his head.

"Alright. Enough of that!" Eddie pulled Barbara away from the scene, pushed her against the wall and quickly handcuffed her. "You're going in now. Nina, do you want to press charges also?"

"Yes, ma'am," Nina confirmed. "She slapped me." Nina held out her arm to show off the red mark that was sure to become a more colorful bruise.

"Officer Janko, why don't you take Nina's statement, and I'll take your prisoner out to the car." Jamie took Barbara by the arm and started walking back to their car. Damn, this was going to be an embarrassing report. He should've had better control of the scene. Moved both parties further away from any loose objects. And because he hadn't, he had hair dye goo in his hair, and probably on his uniform also. And it had to be pink, of all colors. "Watch your head, miss," he advised while helping Barbara into the car.

As soon as Barbara was secured, he opened the trunk and looked for any clean rags. He spotted a roll of paper towels and grabbed a handful off the roll, using them to scrub as much of the dye as possible out of his hair before it dripped anywhere else. _Pink._ And now it was on his hands also.

"Hey, Reagan," Eddie greeted him as she exited the salon. "Ready to go?"

"More than ready," Jamie grumbled. He took his seat in the car, then waited for Eddie to join him before heading for the station house.

Eddie sniffed. "Wow, partner, you're really stinking up the car," she commented.

"Pretty smelly stuff," Jamie retorted and wiped at his watering eyes. "How do you stand it when you get your hair done?"

"We ladies do what we have to so we look pretty for you men, partner," Eddie teased. "And," she whispered to him, "My salon uses less stinky botanical-based products."

In the back seat, Barbara snickered. "Hey, Officer, you might want to give your partner the name of that salon."

Eddie looked back at their prisoner. "And you might want to mind your own business." She turned back to Jamie. "Tell you what. When we get back to the station, I'll process her in, and you go wash that stuff out of your hair."

"Thanks, Ed." Jamie lowered his window a few inches to get some fresh air in the car.

A few minutes later, they arrived back at the station, and Jamie immediately headed for the locker room and the showers in it. He was stripping off his uniform when another officer walked in. "Hey, Beroni," he called to the new arrival.

"Reagan," Sal Beroni acknowledged as he sat down in front of his locker and started taking off one of his shoes. "What happened to you?" the other officer asked as he noticed the goopy splotch on the side of Jamie's head. "Is that blood?"

"Nah. It's nothing," Jamie explained. "This crazy woman at a beauty salon threw a bowl of hair dye and it hit me. Stinks to high heaven."

Beroni stood up and took a closer look. "How long ago did this happen?"

Jamie shrugged. "About a half hour ago. Why?"

Beroni opened his locker and began digging through a bag. "No, not that one," he muttered. "Not that. Where is it?"

"Beroni?" Jamie asked.

"Here it is!" Beroni pulled a bottle out. "Here. Try this shampoo-conditioner. It might help, if it isn't too late already."

"Help what? Too late?" Jamie asked. He took the bottle from Beroni.

"Hair dye usually processes in less than thirty minutes," Beroni explained. "That stuff's probably done its job by now."

"'Done its job?" Jamie thought about what that could mean. "As in, it turned my hair pink?" he asked in horror.

"Listen. Go wash it a couple of times and we'll see what happens. In the meantime, I'll call my Uncle Paulie. He's had a salon for years. He'll work you in for an emergency appointment."

Twenty minutes later, Jamie stood in front of the mirror, staring morosely at his reflection; mostly at the top and left side of his head. "It's pink."

Beroni nodded. "Very pink."

"Like this gum my sister used to like. Bubbleicious." Jamie ran his fingers through the pink mess that was his hair and a few strands broke off in his fingers. _God, could this day get any worse?_

"Looks like it overprocessed also," Beroni commented. "I worked at Uncle Paulie's salon during high school," he explained at Jamie's questioning look.

"Knock-knock," a female voice called from the door.

"Janko," Jamie explained. "Come on in, Ed," he called to her.

Eddie let herself in. "Wow, Reagan, that's really pink. Nina was worried that might happen."

"Fuchsia pink?" Jamie asked.

"No, that's more hot bubblegum pink. Looks like Barbara was right about that part." Eddie tried not to smile at her partner's misfortune.

Jamie sighed. "Go ahead. Let it out."

Eddied restrained herself to a few chuckles. "What are you doing to do?"

"Reagan has an emergency appointment at my uncle's salon in half an hour," Beroni explained. "Uncle Paulie will fix it right up."

==BB==BB==

"Sal! Nephew!" Paulie Beroni boomed as Jamie Reagan followed Sal into his uncle's salon. "And this must be the officer who had the unfortunate hair-dye accident."

"Paulie, meet Jamie Reagan. Jamie, my uncle, Paulie Beroni."

"Pleased to meet you, Sir." Jamie shook the hand Paulie extended.

"And I'm always glad to meet Sal's comrades. Now, let me take a look at this hair."

Jamie pulled his sweatshirt's hood off his head. The early September weather was really too warm for the sweatshirt, but it had been the only way to cover his messed-up hair while leaving the station.

"Damn. That is pink. Have a seat," Paulie gestured toward the nearest chair in the salon. As soon as Jamie had seated himself, Paulie began examining his hair. "Very pink, and very overprocessed," he muttered.

"You can fix it? Make it my normal color?" Jamie asked.

"I can dye it you natural color, but…" Paulie began.

"But?"

"But that pink dye damaged your hair. It probably had a hefty amount of bleaching agent in it. I can dye your hair back to your natural color, but I'm afraid that will only make the breakage worse. Hair can only take so much chemical restructuring before it breaks. And as it breaks, that spot will be shorter than the rest of your hair. Not a good look."

"So what can we do?" Jamie asked. "Leaving it pink isn't an option."

"No, of course not. You're not a teenage girl," Paulie scoffed as his examined Jamie's hair again. "What I can do is dye it your natural color and then do a close-cropped cut. There's a little too much damage on top for a high and tight. I might have to do a buzz cut. Maybe just a bit longer on top. Your hair will grow back nice and healthy, and your natural color."

"Paulie does a good buzz cut. He was a barber in the Navy way back in the day," Sal volunteered.

"Not that you ever let me give you one, nephew," Paulie retorted. "The boy likes that wavy Italian look," he whispered to Jamie. "Thinks it's gonna get him a girl."

"Yeah, and it's working so far. Been married for two years now, remember, Uncle Paulie?" Sal called out.

Jamie sighed quietly. He was going to take so much teasing over this, but it was preferable to pink hair or uneven short patches. "Okay. Let's go for it."

Paulie gripped his shoulder. "You sit here and relax. I'll go get the color mixed up."

==BB==BB==

"And that's what happened. A stupid catfight, and I end up with virtually no hair."

"Nah. It's not that bad." Danny glanced his brother's shorn head again and shook his head. "Kid, it's probably a good thing you didn't follow Grandpa, Dad and I into the Marines."

"Why's that, Dan?" Jamie tried not to get defensive at Danny's remark. His older brother probably wasn't going to rag on him about not being a tough-enough Reagan; not after the day he'd had.

"Because – not sayin' you're ugly or anything; you did get the Reagan and Conor genes – but that haircut is really not your best look." Danny threw an arm around his brother's shoulders. "Come on. Let's go grab some drinks and find a game to watch on that nice TV of yours."

Jamie smiled. "Sir. Yes, Sir!"

==BB==BB==

 _So this is what happens when I'm sitting around the beauty salon waiting for my hair color to process. :) Up tomorrow: the dramatic explanation for Jamie Reagan's haircut._


	2. Version 2: Close Shave and a Haircut

**Version 2: Close Shave and a Haircut**

 _Author's Note: This version bears some similarity to Version 1, until it changes... :D_

==BB==BB==

Danny Reagan banged on his brother's apartment door for the second time. "Kid, I know you're in there. Open up," he called through the door. "I saw your car downstairs." He was reaching for the key he kept in case of emergency when he finally heard the door being unlocked.

"Don't say anything, okay Dan?" Jamie said immediately.

"About what?" Danny looked his brother over and quickly noticed the new haircut, and the row of sutures stretching two inches across his brother's scalp. "Drop and give me fifty, grunt," he teased.

"Come on, Danny."

Danny forced a smirk onto his face and tried to keep his tone light, to keep up the pretense that everything was just fine. "What happened?"

"Like you didn't hear. You just stopped by my place tonight for no reason?"

"I heard an officer from the 12th had a minor incident today. Didn't get all the details." Actually, he had gotten all the gory details from his wife, who had called him after Jamie left St. Vic's ER and filled him in on his brother's eventful afternoon. Not that Jamie needed to know that part. "And I stopped by because I need a place to crash for a few hours. We identified a suspect in that double murder, and he lives just down the street. He typically gets home at four in the morning. Didn't want to disturb Lin and the boys by going home for a few hours." That was true, but after talking to Linda, he'd also wanted to stop by to make sure his kid brother was okay. "But what happened to you?"

Jamie sighed. "It came over the radio as a minor business dispute…"

==BB==BB==

"So, partner, summer or winter?" Eddie Janko asked her partner.

"What about them?" Jamie asked.

"Which do you like better? Hot, sunny summer or cold, snowy winter?"

"Summer," Jamie answered quickly. "It's nice and warm, and you can spend time outside until it gets dark. Which happens a lot later."

"But what about the snow? It makes the trees so pretty"

"Yeah, if you're in a park. Otherwise, it makes the sidewalks slushy and the roads icy."

"Pessimist," Eddie grumbled. "What about for the job? Summer tends to bring out the crazy in people. They spend more time outside interacting with each other and making trouble for us. In winter, they stay inside and away from each other."

"Now who's being a pessimist?"

"12-David, business dispute at the beauty salon," the dispatcher rattled of the address.

"See, just like this. It's summer, and people are freaking out at a beauty salon. One of the most relaxing places you can go," Eddie argued even as Jamie increased his speed. This didn't sound like a call that required the lights and siren.

A few minutes later, he brought the car to a stop in front of the salon, and the two officers made their way into the business.

"Back there," the receptionist gestured toward a station halfway down the room. "Nina's customer, Barbara, is going nuts."

Jamie glanced in the direction the receptionist was pointing. Two women were facing each other across a salon chair, both screaming at each other. "Nina! Barbara! What's the problem here?" he called to the women as he and Eddie walked toward them.

Barbara turned to the officers, then back to Nina. "You called the cops, you incompetent bitch?" she yelled at Nina and started moving around the chair.

Nina moved another step also. "I didn't call. Not that you don't deserve it, slapping me like that. Crazy whore!"

"Hey! Ladies!" Jamie yelled at the two as he and Eddie ran to separate them. "What's this about?"

"She thinks she can tell me how to do my job," Nina huffed.

"I can, you dumbass. I wanted fuchsia highlights. But look at this color. Look!" Barbara pointed toward a bowl of hair color on a stand beside the chair. "That's hot bubblegum pink, not fuchsia."

Jamie looked at the bowl. Fuchsia was a shade of pink, if he remembered right, and that goo was definitely pink. "Nina, is this the color Barbara wanted?"

"It would have come out fuchsia if she'd let me finish," Nina insisted. "I'm the color specialist here. Not that beauty school dropout. Thinks she knows everything because she finished one quarter." Nina directed her last comment at her irate client.

That was apparently the last straw for Barbara. "You incompetent tramp!" she screamed. Before Eddie could stop her, she grabbed a tool off one of the hairdresser's stands and charged at Nina.

"Hey!" Jamie yelled. He stepped between Nina and the charging woman and tried to deflect her arm away from them both. Despite his efforts, whatever Barbara was holding struck him in the head. He felt a stinging pain across the top left side of his head, and almost immediately after, felt blood running down his scalp. "Ouch!" He ducked to the ground, taking Nina down with him and tripping up Barbara in the process.

"Alright. Enough of that!" Eddie pulled Barbara back to her feet and away from Jamie and Nina, pushed her against the wall and wrestled the razor out of her hand. "Drop it!"

Jamie scrambled to his feet was at his partner's side seconds later, pulling out his handcuffs to restrain the enraged woman. "Okay. Now you're going in. For a stupid fight over hair color. Nina, do you want to press charges also?"

"Yes, sir," Nina confirmed. "She slapped me." Nina held out her arm to show off the red mark that was sure to become a more colorful bruise.

"Reagan, you okay?" Eddie asked.

"I'm fine," Jamie replied. "It's just a little cut."

Eddie moved around to Jamie's left side. "Let me see." She stood up as tall as she could, until she could see the long, shallow gash on the side of his head; a gash that was bleeding profusely. "Jamie, that's more than a 'little cut'. You need to sit down now. Nina, do you have a clean towel?"

"Yes, Officer." Nina ran to the shampooing room to retrieve the towel.

"Ed, come on. It's not that bad. Head wounds bleed more than others." Jamie tried to argue, even as he felt blood seeping down the side of his neck. _Maybe it_ is _that bad_ …

"Yeah, well that's still a _lot_ of blood," Eddie argued. She pulled Barbara to one of the beautician's stations away from Jamie, but still within her sight line. "You. Sit there and stay put," she ordered.

"Whatever," Barbara snipped.

Eddie fixed a glare on the woman. "6-David, requesting a bus and an additional unit at our location," she barked into her radio before returning to her partner, grabbing his arm and leading him to a chair. "And you sit here," she ordered Jamie. She spun the chair around so they could both keep an eye on Barbara, then pushed Jamie down into the chair.

"Officer, here's the towel you asked for." Nina held the towel out to Eddie.

"Thanks." Eddie grabbed the towel, folded it, and pressed it against her partner's head to staunch the flow of blood.

Jamie winced and hissed in pain at the pressure. "Ed, come on. This isn't necessary."

Eddie looked at the towel, which was already turning red. "Yes it is. Stay still."

For a few minutes, both Barbara and Jamie stayed sitting where Eddie had put them. Then Barbara stood up. "Seems you have you hands full. I'll just head on out," she informed the officers as she took a step toward the door.

"You sit back down!" Jamie barked at her. "You take one more step toward that door, and we'll add charges of resting arrest, fleeing and theft to the ones you're already facing." He raised his hand to hold the towel against his head, freeing Eddie to control Barbara.

"Theft?" Barbara asked.

"Of my handcuffs," Jamie replied as Eddie moved to block any escape attempt.

Barbara sighed and sat back down. "What-ev-er."

Only a minute later, the ambulance arrived, followed almost immediately by a second patrol unit. Eddie directed the medics to her partner, and helped Kara Walsh and her partner get Barbara out to their car. Once the woman was secured, Eddie headed back inside to find one of the medics wrapping gauze around her partner's head. "How's he doing?"

" _He_ is getting dragged to the hospital," Jamie griped. "You had to call a bus, didn't you?"

Eddie looked at her wounded partner and tried not to smile. He was quite a sight, with gauze wrapped all the way around his head, over the wound and under his chin, to hold a thick wad of gauze in place over the actual gash. "You'd rather pass out from blood loss?"

"No." Jamie sighed as he tried to figure out how to keep his family from hearing about this little kerfuffle.

The medic finished securing the gauze. "Now, he's not going to pass out. You wouldn't do that to me, would you, Officer?" the medic teased.

"I'm fine," Jamie insisted.

"But he's going to need some stitches to close that wound," he told Eddie. "Now, Officer, off to the ambulance with you."

"Don't need the bus," Jamie muttered as he stood up.

The medic shrugged. "Okay. I'll let your partner drive you in. Then you can sit around the waiting room for the rest of the day. I'm sure the doctor will get around to seeing you before that gash gets infected. They're always so prompt about seeing walk-in patients with minor injuries. Or you can take the ride in, and get seen by a doctor right away."

Eddie grabbed her partner's arm. "He'll take your ride. Jamie, be nice to the medic."

"Okay. But can we skip the gurney?" Jamie begged.

==BB==BB==

"And we're all done," the doctor told Jamie as she tied off the last of the sutures closing the gash across the top left side of his head. "What do you think, Nurse Linda?"

"A fine job of suturing, Doctor Tolson," Linda Reagan replied.

"Officer Reagan, do you want to take a look?" Doctor Tolson held up a mirror.

"Why not?" It couldn't make this day any worse, he figured. Jamie glanced up at the mirror the doctor was holding and saw the tidy line of small stitches stretching across his scalp in the middle of a spot shaved bare of any hair. "Nice work," he said, but didn't quite manage to keep the dismayed look off his face.

"Any scarring will be minimal, and not even noticeable once your hair grows back," the doctor told him.

"That's good, but until then, I'm going to look goofy," Jamie moped.

The doctor scribbled something on her prescription pad. "I'm giving you a prescription for a pain medication. I'd suggest you fill it. Once that local wears off, that wound is going to hurt. Lots of nerves in your scalp." She handed him the prescription. "The hospital pharmacy is on the lower level. Linda can show you where it is after she goes over your after-care instructions. And we have a barber shop right next door that can even out your hair."

"Thanks, Doc." Jamie picked up the mirror again and took another look. He had a feeling that 'evening out' his hair meant that he was about to have a whole lot less of it.

==BB==BB==

"And that's what happened. A stupid catfight, and I end up nearly getting scalped."

"Nah. It's not that bad." Danny glanced at the row of stitches again. _But bad enough_. "Did you take the pain meds the doc gave you?"

Jamie glared at his brother. "You _did_ talk to Linda. You knew what happened before you showed up," he griped.

"Maybe I did," Danny admitted. "Linda was concerned you wouldn't take a pain pill if you needed it if you were alone."

"They make my brain fuzzy."

"Well, I'm here. You can go fuzzy. Pop those pills."

"I don't need 'em," Jamie argued, even though his head really was hurting.

"Sure you don't," Danny scoffed. He knew from experience that scalp wounds bled a lot, and they hurt a lot, too.

"Fine." Jamie retrieved a pill bottle from his jeans pocket, shook one pill into his hand and swallowed it dry. "Happy now?"

Danny shook his head as he looked over his brother once again, taking in the sutures and the ridiculously short haircut. "Kid, it's probably a good thing you didn't follow Grandpa, Dad and I into the Marines."

"Why's that, Dan?" Jamie tried not to get defensive at Danny's remark. His older brother probably wasn't going to rag on him for not being a tough-enough Reagan; not after the day he'd had.

"Because – not sayin' you're ugly or anything; you did get the Reagan and Conor genes – but that haircut is really not your best look." Danny threw an arm around his brother's shoulders. "Come on. Let's go grab some drinks and find a game to watch on that nice TV of yours."

Jamie smiled. "Sir. Yes, Sir!"

* * *

 _And that's two of the many explanations... Thanks for the reviews!  
_


End file.
